Lovesystems instructors explain how to react if a woman you've approached calls you a "player"

I finally stepped up to the plate this year with my New Year’s Resolution. Learning the Emotional Progression Model (part of the revolutionary Love Systems Triad Model) in your book Magic Bullets was a lifesaver – I realized right away that I was a typical “nice guy” who tried to build comfort before building attraction (and I’d never even thought of qualification). And then a couple of months ago I took the plunge and took my Love Systems bootcamp with Braddock and Fader.

Since the bootcamp, I’ve been with six women (and I’ve had the opportunity to be with a lot more) and I feel that extra confidence and control in my job, with friends, and in the rest of my life in general.

So, things are going great, but I’ve noticed one problem. Sometimes I’ll meet a woman who I’m into and she’ll call me a “player” or a “playboy” or something like that. I’m not really sure how to handle this, and I hope you have some advice for me.

Thanks for the feedback, and I’m glad things are going well. Sleeping with six attractive women in a couple of months and having lots of options isn’t bad at all, especially after a four-year drought.

But, it seems like you’ve hit a bit of a roadblock. Some women are calling you a player when you meet them.

First of all, relax. The fact that this is happening is:

A good sign.

Normal for your skill level.

Going to go away by itself anyway.

I’ll explain why – and then I’ll do an “advanced section” at the end that uses Love Systems framing techniques to show you what to do the next time a woman asks if you’re a player.

Why is it a good sign if a woman asks if you’re a player? Because she’s interested in you, of course. Think about it. Does a woman ask the nerdy nice guy if he’s a player? Does she ask the obviously sleazy lounge lizard? No. She doesn’t care. She is asking you, because she is attracted to you and wants to get a handle on the situation.

This is normal for where you are. You’re one of those guys who got better with women all of a sudden. About half of our bootcamp students are like this – guys who didn’t have a ton of success beforehand. The other half are intermediate or advanced guys, which is why we bring a lot of instructors to every program, so you have personal attention.

What happens when you get better suddenly is that your brain takes longer to get used to the success that you’re having. Your sub-communication isn’t yet congruent with the new, successful you. In other words, your “outer game” (the techniques, tactics, routines, etc.) has outpaced your “inner game” (your psychology, confidence and beliefs). This is a very temporary phenomenon. As you keep getting more successes under your belt, your inner game will catch up as you start to realize that you deserve these successes.

And you do. You – yes you, E.J., and everyone like you. You go out, you show women good times, you attract them, they feel comfortable with you, and they want to sleep with you and date you. You deserve all the results you are getting. All your instructors did at your bootcamp was give you the tools – but the personality you’re conveying is one you had in you the whole time.

Over the next few weeks, or a couple of months at most, this will go away. Your inner game will catch up by itself.

Now, if you’re interested, I’ll go into something a little more advanced on how to use framing to respond when a woman says something like this. It’s not too advanced for you – you’ve been to a bootcamp after all – but for guys reading this who are just starting out, don’t stress if the advanced section doesn’t immediately seem crystal clear to you.

Advanced Section

Here’s the deal. She’s asked you if you’re a player, or accused you of being a player. Where do you go with this? Just for fun, I’m going to throw some good and bad options in here. Test yourself by reading them all and choosing the one you’d want to use, which other ones are good, and which are bad. Then read on to see how you did.

Her: “You’re a player, aren’t you?”

“No I’m not. I’m just playful. I come off like a player sometimes, but I’m actually pretty genuine.”

“Thank you. I think you’re pretty cool yourself. Wait... do you like to travel?”

“Cool. So my friend Dave over there, he was telling me that [continue into a new subject]...”

“Why would you say that?”

“Player? I’m not a player, I’m Super Casanova. I have 19 girlfriends in this bar and another 23 at home. [Continue into the “8 Girlfriends” routine from the Love Systems Routines Manual Volume 1]”

“Yeah, so what do you like about player guys so much?”

Alright, let’s look at each of these. Don’t read on until you’ve thought through each of these five options and evaluated which are good, which are bad, and why.

This one is bad. You are letting her set the frame, and the frame isn’t a good one (asking you to justify yourself to her). A frame is the underlying context that makes an action make sense. So when she asks if you are a player, the underlying frame is that she is asking you to justify that you’re not a player and that you are hitting on her and she is evaluating you.

I hope I don’t need to explain why that is a bad frame. So, even if you give the perfect answer to “reassure” her that you’re not a player – which isn’t necessarily what you should be doing anyway, but we’ll leave that for later – you’re still in that frame.

Moreover, the very act of letting her set frames like this and accepting them is in itself an indicator of low social status. So, this is a bad response for two reasons – you bought into her frame, and the frame itself a bad one.

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This is willful misinterpretation, and I love this one. I tend to treat everything like it’s a compliment. Instead of buying into her frame “justify to me that you’re not a player” you are resetting it. Now the frame is “We seem to be attracted to each other. Let me see if you like to travel (i.e., let me see if you’re what I’m looking for)” – which puts her in the position of justifying herself to me.

So, you’ve reset the frame – and being able to do that is actually quite attractive to women. In addition, the frame you’ve set is now a good one. Now she’s the one hitting on you, and you’re evaluating or screening her.

But, there’s more going on here. Let’s go back to the Emotional Progression section of the Triad Model. This model, first revealed in my book Magic Bullets (download the free chapters from the Magic Bullets page here) and then updated in the Triad Model (first appearing in the Love Systems Routines Manual 2) takes you through the seven stages from first meeting a woman to an eventual relationship with her. Not only do these seven phases have to happen, but they have to happen in order. It’s an extremely helpful tool, because when you’re talking with a woman, you don’t have to worry about how to sleep with her or date her, you just have to worry about getting to the next stage. Keep doing that, and everything else will fall into place.

To review, the stages of the model are:

As we talked about earlier, a woman will only ask if you’re a player if she is attracted to you. Once she is attracted, MOVE FORWARD. One common mistake I see intermediate-level guys make is they wallow forever in the Attraction phase. It makes sense – it’s fun when a beautiful woman is laughing at your jokes, touching you, telling you how sexy you are, shooting jealous looks at other women, and so on. But, it’s not necessary and can be counter-productive. We have dozens of attraction routines in the Love Systems Routines Manuals Volume 1 and Volume 2 so you have a choice, not because you need to use them all. (A routine is something specific you can say or do and is repeatable. So, if you’re not used to how attraction works, you can use attraction routines from the Routines Manual based on the word-for-word scripts. Both the Love Systems Routines Manual Volume 1 and Volume 2 have routines for each phase of the Emotional Progression Model, as well as guides and templates for creating your own.)

So, back to this response – not only does it get rid of her (unhelpful) frame and introduce a helpful one, it also advances you from the Attraction phase into the Qualification phase – that’s where you screen her to solidify that attraction and make her earn your sustained interest. A lot of that happens through screening questions (“do you like to travel?” is a very light screening question, good for starting the Qualification phase).

This isn’t a reframe; it’s the establishment of a completely new frame. It’s fine, not great. #2 acknowledges her frame and then pivots out of it, which is better when she is asking you something specific about yourself. A response like #3 might lead her to think that you are “avoiding the subject” (which is weak) rather than “being in your own reality.”

The underlying principle is a good one though, and works well to change the subject on most unhelpful conversations. Just because a woman says something does not mean that you are obligated to continue that conversation. Some conversational topics are just not likely to help you – at least not as likely to help as your best routines. Some examples of bad conversational topics that you will want to cut off include:

This is another reason why the Love Systems Routines Manual Volume 1 and Volume 2 are so valuable – because they’ve got hundreds of word-for-word scripts you can have at your fingertips, you will never be stuck in a conversational topic that is unhelpful. You will always have something ready to go that is interesting and effective and can rescue you from conversational traps, even when you can’t think of anything in the moment.

This is bad for the same reasons as #1, though at least you’re not actively trying to justify yourself. You’ve still bought completely into her frame, and it’s a frame that isn’t going to help you. If she genuinely likes players – and many women do – she already likes you and there’s no need to talk more about it. Most women who like players don’t like to talk about why they like players, and most women who like players are attracted to the type of men who can effortlessly and smoothly get them into bed in a way that feels exciting and comfortable. A response like this implies that this won’t be the case with you. And of course if she doesn’t like players (or thinks she doesn’t like players), you’re not going to go anywhere by talking more about you and your relative level of playerness. So, get off the subject.

This isn’t a reframe and it isn’t a new frame. It’s still the same frame, but now you own it. You’ve also defused the poison from the comment by exaggerating it to absurdity, and you’ve also expressed dominance and injected humor.

You can do this with any test a woman gives you early in an interaction. Simplify, agree, and exaggerate to absurdity.

“No I’m not. I’m just playful. I come off like a player sometimes, but I’m actually pretty genuine.”

“Thank you. I think you’re pretty cool yourself. Wait, do you like to travel?”

“Cool. So, my friend Dave over there, he was telling me that [continue into a new subject]...”

How she has to get up early tomorrow.

Where her friends are and whether they are looking for her.

Things she feels guilty about.

Right-brain (logical) problems she is having in her life – finances, school, work, etc.

Her “boyfriend” or other men in her life.

Etc.

“Why would you say that?”

“Player? I’m not a player, I’m Super Casanova. I have 19 girlfriends in this bar and another 23 at home. [Continue into the “8 Girlfriends” routine from the Love Systems Routines Manual Volume 1]”

“Yeah, so what do you like about player guys so much?”

This one can also work, but is kind of old technology. It implies that what she said is a compliment, but not as well as the “thank you” from #2. And instead of moving forward along the Emotional Progression path into Qualification, this answer keeps you in Attraction and keeps you in the same, player-ish, conversation. At best, going down this path will get her to give you compliments and other indications that she is attracted to you. But you already know – or should know – that she’s attracted to you or the conversation wouldn’t have gotten to that point. And you have some of the same disadvantages as #4.

In general, this is another response that should pass the test, but doesn’t actually get you very far.

I wanted to give you a bunch of different options, in part so you can find something you are comfortable with, and in part to show that there is usually not just one solution to anything in dating science. That, incidentally, is a major premise underlying my book Magic Bullets, and one of the reasons I wrote the book. Dating science is not a one-size-fits-all approach. That’s why I advise guys to learn from their friends who may be successful with women, but don’t blindly copy everything they do. The Love Systems approach is to make the most of what you have. Since all Love Systems instructors have slightly different techniques and strategies, we bring a bunch of them to every bootcamp.